Wednesday, December 7, 2011

2011-12-07 "Shut the Ports Down on December 12!" Call-to-Action by "Labor, Black and Brown"
[http://redrave.blogspot.com/2011/12/shut-ports-down-on-december-12-call-by.html]
Labor, Black and Brown, Unite!
ALL OUT TO DEFEND ILWU LOCAL21
AN INJURY TO ONE IS AN INJURY TO ALL
In Longview, WA, the capitalists of the EGT conglomerate are engaged in union-busting against ILWU Local 21. EGT plans to unload their grain on a ship in the Longview port using scab (union-busting) labor. According to the ILWU West Coast Contract this work is supposed to be done by workers represented by ILWU Local 21. Shut the Ports on Dec 12! Stop the scabs on Dec 15!
According to the Transport Workers Solidarity Committee, the ILWU is "...facing a frontal attack, threatening the future of our jobs and our unions. What is needed to defeat these employer assaults is a solid union action, shutting down the coast." Join the Caravan to Longview Dec 15th!
What does this mean? Last year on October 23rd, when ILWU local 10 shut down the Bay Area ports they called for "Justice For Oscar Grant" and organized a 3,000 strong "Labor/Community Rally" in Downtown Oakland, in Frank Ogawa Plaza (now re-named "Oscar Grant Plaza"). The ILWU led the working class in Oakland in uniting across race lines against racist police murder and injustice by saying this injustice will cost the bosses!

THE POLITICAL STRIKE WAS LAUNCHED FOR RACIAL JUSTICE AND AGAINST POLICE MURDER! The PMA lost a lot of money, and their scheduling was disrupted. Stuck on the ships; No cargo moved! Idle were the ports but not the consciousness of the people. The seeds of Nov 2nd and Dec 12th were watered during the fight for justice for Oscar Grant!
"An Injury to One, is an Injury to All! The ILWU membership puts it’s money and sacrifice where their mouth is. That's one of the reasons the bosses hate the ILWU. They wield for others, the kind of power that the entire working class must use to defend and advance the rights of working people and the most oppressed everywhere. In every corner of the world where workers struggle against imperialism they know the internationalist heart of the ILWU and they call on us to SHUT THE PORTS DOWN!

GAZA IS WATCHING, EGYPT IS WATCHING, DURBAN, COCHIBAMBA, FUKISHIMA, BUENOS AIRES, AUCKLAND, HARARE, ACROSS THE PLANET THE MOST OPPRESSED AND EXPLOITED KNOW WHAT WE DO HERE STRIKES A BLOW AT THE HEART OF IMPERIALISM.
Members and supporters of the ILWU are calling for a West-Coast wide port shut down. As the ILWU - led October 23rd, 2010 Bay Area port shut down was in defense of the rights of Black and Brown people, and all working people, this proposed coast-wide port shut down is in defense of ILWU Local 21, the whole ILWU and the entire union movement. They are defending the very existence of unions
For the sake of Black and Brown rights, for the sake of Black and Brown pride, we must not allow the ILWU fight alone. Every union, every worker, every able-bodied Black and Brown person must join the battle to defend the ILWU. If we merely spectate, and allow the bosses to defeat the ILWU, this bodes ill for the poor and working folk. If ILWU looses Longview to the scabs we all loose!
Who can deny the current capitalist goal of smashing unions? Who can deny the capitalists' goal of smashing all resistance to the continued marginalization of Brown and Black people, and community? Who can deny the use of police terror to obtain our submission? We know this is a racist class war to keep the 0.01% in power! The continued rule of he capitalist class and its twin profit parties. is unsustainable.
We say NO! Just as we rose up for "Justice for Oscar Grant!" and stated "We Are All Oscar Grant!" we must now stand up and unite Labor Black and Brown-Shut the Port Down! The ILWU carried the message of the potential power of the union movement. We must join these movements of resistance, uniting the fight of the workers with the fight of the Brown and Black communities.

WE ARE LABOR BLACK AND BROWN
Labor Black and Brown organize and unite in struggle against the capitalist bosses and their representatives. We expose and oppose those who act to prevent the independent political organization and political action of labor Black and Brown people. They act as transmission belts for the bosses’ ideology into our community. In the fight for jobs, for our unions, for our schools, against police brutality, to defend native and aboriginal rights, against the prison industrial complex and with #occupy and the ILWU you will find labor Black and Brown. We say it is time to build the democratic working class/labor Black and Brown organizations, assemblies, and neighborhood and factory action committees!
In these organizations and struggles labor Black and Brown will advance demands, slogans a strategy and tactics which lead our people and our class toward political and economic independence and power!
We say down with phony police review commissions: Form up labor Black and Brown tribunals to try killer cops! Build a General Strike movement against police brutality!
We say cops out of our communities, out of our schools, off our campuses! Build labor Black and Brown self defense guards against racist attacks, against la migra, against police brutality; against scabs taking union jobs and to defend the #occupy activists!
We say the system is the crime! Tear down the prison industrial complex! Free Hugo Pinell, Free Leonard Peltier Free Mumia Abu Jamal! Free all political prisoners!
We defend our immigrant sisters and brothers. We demand full citizenship rights for immigrants. End corporate sweatshop exploitation! Organize immigrant workers! Defeat ICE!
We say down with the forced austerity: Jobs for all! 30 hours work for 40 hours pay! Poverty is the crime! Open the books of industry! Provide a sliding scale of wages and prices! We demand billions for public works create millions of ethical, green, humane jobs now! Educate and train all willing workers, provide day care, public laundry and communal kitchens!
We say health care is a right! Socialize the medical industry under health care workers and community control! End drug profiteering free medical science from corporate control!
We say today’s labor leaders are not our friends, they do the bosses dirty work demobilizing the membership and trapping us inside the bosses’ political parties. For labor Black and Brown to lead the class collaborationist labor leaders must be replaced by rank and file members dedicated to class independence and united labor Black Brown strike action.
We stand with the colonized and native people in their struggle to save mother earth from the barbarism of the imperialist rape of the land and destruction of the people and their ancestral traditions. Free Hawaii! Free Puerto Rico! Defend sovereign people’s treaty rights!
We stand for the defeat of imperialist exploitation across Africa, Asia and Latin America!
We stand against imperialist war mongering in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Libya and the saber rattling toward Iran! In wars against the third world and in inter-imperialist wars we call for:
* DEFEAT OF US IMPERIALISM!
* JUSTICE FOR OSCAR GRANT-JUSTICE FOR RAHEIM BROWN AND ALL VICTIMS OF POLICE VIOLENCE. FOR GENERAL STRIKES TO JAIL KILLER COPS!
* DROP THE CHARGES AND RELEASE ALL ARRESTED OCCUPY ACTIVISTS
* HANDS OFF WHISTLEBLOWERS SEAN GILLIS, DORIEN MAXWELL &TOPAZ DUBOIS

2011-11-02 photograph showing a scene during the Oakland General Strike

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